The background description provided herein is for the purpose of generally presenting the context of the disclosure. Work of the presently named inventors, to the extent it is described in this background section, as well as aspects of the description that may not otherwise qualify as prior art at the time of filing, are neither expressly nor impliedly admitted as prior art against the present disclosure.
Remote desktop virtualization implementations operate as client/server computing environments. Application execution takes place on a virtual desktop of a virtual machine which is linked to the local client device over a network or a cloud using a remote display protocol through which the user interacts with applications. All applications and data used remain on the virtual machine with only display, keyboard, and mouse information communicated with the local client device which may be a conventional personal computer, a laptop computer, a thin client device, a tablet, or even a smartphone. A common implementation of this approach is to host multiple desktop operating system instances on a virtual machine hardware platform running a hypervisor. This is generally referred to as “Virtual Desktop Infrastructure” or “VDI”.
Remote desktop virtualization is frequently used in the following scenarios: (a) In distributed environments with high availability requirements and where desk-side technical support is not readily available, such as branch office and retail environments, (b) in environments where high network latency degrades the performance of conventional client/server applications, (c) In environments where remote access and data security requirements create conflicting requirements that can be addressed by retaining all (application) data within the data center with only display, keyboard, and mouse information communicated with the remote client, (d) It is also used as a means of providing access to Windows applications on non-Windows endpoints including tablets, smart phones and non-Windows-based desktop PCs and laptops, and (e) Remote desktop virtualization is also used as a means of resource sharing, to provide low-cost desktop computing services in environments where providing every user with a dedicated desktop PC is either too expensive or otherwise unnecessary.
Deployment of such a VDI is a very complex task. It involves large amount of hardware configuration, software configuration, virtual machine configuration, virtual desktop configuration, and user configuration. Conventionally, most of such deployment is done locally, and involves intensive and manual installations and configurations. Such a deployment is tedious, unreliable, difficult and prone to errors. Therefore, it is desirable to devise a virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) deployment system to deploy a VDI systematically, automatically, and remotely to ensure speedy low cost deployment, and to allow an administrator of the VDI to upgrade, install, refresh hundreds of virtual desktop nodes all from one central, remote location.
Therefore, an unaddressed need exists in the art to address the aforementioned deficiencies and inadequacies.